I was sure that the Shelagh Stephenson
was Irish, but she isn’t. She was born in Northumberland, where her play Ancient
Lightstakes place. That may
be significant, since an Irish novelist in the play turns out to be English,
from Hull, a port city that I think is in Northumberland. Indeed, almost all
the characters in Ancient Lights are
not what they seem; and neither, one of them discovers, is the title.

            This
is the third play by Stephenson which Shipping Dock Theatre has produced in a
solid production with some of Rochester’s best actors. I admired the first, The Memory of Water, extravagantly, and
liked Shipping Dock’s second, An
Experiment With An Air Pump. But for all its complexities, this one
disappoints.

            Possibly,
John R. Jaeger’s straightforward direction might have lifted the comedy a bit
had he gone for more lively comic quirks, but I think the problem is the
script. At the end, the three characters who are old friends relax together
while smoking a joint, and create a closing scene with more charm and fun. I
think that release would have been undercut had Jaeger made them too foolish
earlier, since the comedy comes from their stereotypical failings.

            A
strong cast makes these celebrity types as appealing as the script allows.
Sammy Urzetta plays sexy movie star Tom Cavallero. Tom has a romantic view of
England, where he is returning to visit old college chums, including Bea, a
public relations whiz, who is helping him handle a scandal over seducing an
underage girl in the United States. He remembers the mystical sign, “Ancient
Lights,” on an English building, but later finds that it actually has a wholly
mundane meaning.

            Also
visiting Bea for Christmas, their other college friend, Kitty, reports bravely
on danger spots for TV news. But, in fact, she’s too easily upset and won’t do
that anymore. Alternately furious and lachrymose, Kitty is never calm, but
Virginia Flavin somehow makes her likable.

            Patricia
Lewis makes Bea glamorous and wryly observant. Bea is more tolerant toward her
friends’ deceptions than toward her lover’s pretenses. But she and Tad
(Terrance Brennan) are perhaps the most honestly affectionate people in the
play, and they have a nice rapport as the embattled lovers.

            Completing
the cast are Ruth Hollinger as Bea’s entirely self-involved precocious
daughter, Joni, and Maureen Mines as Tom’s adoring companion, Iona. These two
characters, of course, have their own identity-confusions also. With a camera
apparently implanted against one eye, Iona drives the others mad by endlessly
pointing it at them, making, she says, a documentary about Tom.

            Unfortunately,
though these willful folks insist that they don’t want a camera on them in
private moments, not one smashes it into intrusive Iona’s face. Mines is an
actress capable of considerable charm, but this character is hopelessly
annoying.

            Ultimately,
all these gags about successful but misunderstood and unhappy folks who are not
really what they seem do not let us know them or like them enough to care about
them — much less to worry about the questions they raise about the nature of
identity.

            Tom,
who has a funny riff about having tried every imaginable self-help and
outside-help fad, is too messy in his mixed motives to be taken seriously. And
I fear that so is the play.

            The
hokey story that Tad tells about a man horrified at seeing a doppelganger image
of himself, comes back in Tom’s seeing himself in Iona’s film and freaking out.
Then damned if the three friends don’t solemnly end the play by telling Tad’s
story all over again. It was his own self what he saw, you see! But, as Milt
Gross once wisely said, “Actual, it didn’t really was.”

Ancient Lights: A Comedyby Shelagh Stephenson, directed by John R. Jaeger, plays at
Shipping Dock Theatre, Visual Studies Auditorium, 31 Prince Street, Fridays and
Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sundays at 2 p.m. through May 8. Tix: $12 to
$22. 232-2250, www.shippingdocktheatre.org.

This article appears in Apr 28 – May 4, 2004.